After reading some recent debates in online Mormon forums about whether paying tithing should count as giving to charity and/or count in surveys about charitable giving, I encountered an interesting statement from Utah billionaire Jon Hunstman, Sr (he’s the father of the Jon Huntsman who ran for president in 2008). He weighed in:

They require 10% tithing. I don’t consider that to be philanthropy and I don’t consider it to be part of my philanthropic giving. I consider it as club dues.

People who put money in the church basket and people who go to church and pay the pastor: that isn’t real philanthropy, that’s just like you belong to a country club. You pay your dues to belong to that church so you pay your tithing or whatever it is.

Utah ranks number 1 in charitable giving in any survey I’ve seen, largely, I suppose, due to tithing. But I think Huntsman has a point. Isn’t donating to your own church (especially a religion like ours where tithing is used exclusively for buildings/manuals/etc. and not for helping the needy) pretty much like paying country club dues? You pay tithing and it keeps the lights on and the AC running in the very building you occupy every Sunday. Consider fast offerings, for example, as being a different type of giving: they go 100% to the needy.

Sadly, I’ve encountered occasional Mormons who pat themselves on the back for being far more generous in their giving than the average American, based solely on paying tithing and a token amount in fast offerings. I don’t think this counts, and I feel that a true comparison excludes tithing. We should consider whether we are truly being generous with our wealth or simply giving most our donations away to our country club.

On a related note, is fulfilling a calling as a primary teacher or even bishop the same type of volunteerism as volunteering at a soup kitchen? Is there a “hierarchy of charity”?